


Of Comfort and Despair

by Medeafic



Series: Circus [3]
Category: Glee RPF, Star Trek RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Circus, Circus, F/F, M/M, Masturbation, Rimming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-07
Updated: 2012-02-07
Packaged: 2017-10-30 18:21:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/334711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Medeafic/pseuds/Medeafic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zach and Chris come to an arrangement.  Chris discovers a new side to Lea, but he still has issues with other members of the troupe - including Dianna.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of Comfort and Despair

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jaymamazing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaymamazing/gifts), [pippin004](https://archiveofourown.org/users/pippin004/gifts).



> _________________________________________________________________  
> Warnings: Rimming (M/M). A character has a panic attack and feels ashamed about it. Mentions of addiction and parental death and abandonment.  
> _________________________________________________________________

Chris has gotten into the habit of an early morning run since he’s stopped trapeze. If he pushes hard enough, his mind goes quiet and all he can hear is his own harsh breathing and the pulse in his ears. It doesn’t matter where he runs; beach, sidewalk, forest – it’s all the same to him. He puts in earphones so people will assume he can’t hear them, but he never listens to anything except the rhythmic sound of his body’s respiration.  
  
It’s become a dichotomy – his mind and body are so divorced now, since he’s stopped trapeze. He used to feel much more synchronized, his mind quieting when his body and instinct took over, up there in the air, just before he pulled back and swung out. Now his mind doesn’t ever seem to shut up; it’s lost its discipline. But he can get it back when he runs.  
  
And, boy, does he need his discipline this morning. Watching Zach have his clothes ripped off while he was tied to a wooden board played havoc with Chris’s dreams last night, woke him three times with an aching hard-on before he gave up on trying to sleep through it. He gave his cock a perfunctory, fast-paced jerking, spilled all over his stomach and had to wipe himself down with the sheet like a teenager. His alarm was set for only thirty minutes later, so Chris figured he might as well shower and change his sheets.  
  
He’s half an hour earlier than usual for his run, and the rest of the troupe is still sleeping, or at least, there’s no one around. Chris heads into the forest. He’ll have to go slower than usual and watch for roots and stones, but it smells fresh and primitive, and it’s not long at all before his mind goes dull.  
  
A few minutes later, the silence is broken by a shout. It startles Chris enough that he stumbles and has to catch at a tree trunk to regain his balance. He pulls out his earphones and looks around.  
  
“Up here!”  
  
He looks up. It’s Zach, sitting on a tree branch and swinging his legs.  
  
“You naturally that clumsy?” he asks Chris. “Maybe you should’ve gone into clowning.”  
  
“Bite me.”  
  
“What’re you doing?”  
  
“What does it look like?”  
  
Zach tips backwards off the branch and somersaults gracefully to the ground. “You’re cranky,” he observes. “Haven’t you had your morning coffee yet?”  
  
“Nope, as a matter of fact, I haven’t.” They start walking together deeper into the forest, their feet crunching on dry leaves and twigs. Chris thinks about the first time they were alone together, after dinner the night Zach arrived, and feels embarrassed again about his loser panic attack. Zach must think he’s crazy. Or worse: sensitive.  
  
Last night after the opening show, Zach approached him to talk about trapeze training. Chris had made some bullshit excuse, not yes, not no, and ran away with his metaphorical tail between his legs. The truth is, although Lea has apparently refused to even consider it, Zach’s instinctive movement and acrobatic background make him a natural for flying. Chris can imagine exactly the kind of routine he would choreograph for him, a long, vivid blur spinning across the Big Top...but he’s still not comfortable with the idea.  
  
“Given any more thought to the trapeze training?” Zach asks after a while.  
  
“You’re blunt.”  
  
“I’m not trying to be.”  
  
“Lea doesn’t want to do it.”  
  
“No, but I do.”  
  
“So you’re going to persuade her? I’d like to see that. Or are you planning to fly and catch yourself?” Zach stops and Chris walks a few steps more before turning to look back at him. “What?”  
  
“I thought things were okay between us – that’s what you said the other day.”  
  
Chris looks at the ground. He hasn’t seen much of Zach since his arrival, thanks to the fact that Zach is everyone’s new best friend. He’s proving to be universally popular. Lea is not, although Di’s appreciation of her seems to be swaying things in her favor.  
  
“We  _are_  cool,” Chris says. “I just don’t know if I’m comfortable with the training thing. Lea doesn’t want to do it anyway, and that’s up to her.”  
  
Zach comes closer to him and touches his shoulder. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable about anything.”  
  
Chris pulls back, scowling. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to  _collapse_  again.”  
  
“I didn’t think you were.”  
  
Chris starts marching again, and hears Zach follow. They walk in silence for some time, listening to the sounds of the forest around them. It’s getting lighter and hotter with the rising sun, and Chris finds himself slowing, his irritation dying.  
  
“I’m sorry. I’m being a dick.”  
  
“Well, only a little,” Zach says graciously, and Chris laughs. “That’s better. Why so glum today?”  
  
Chris is tired because he sat up late last night arguing with himself over whether he should do the training or not. It’s also strange to be sleeping in his own trailer after so long and, although he doesn’t want to admit it, he misses Di’s company. Even just having her reading there in the room with him, he misses the proximity of another human being. He’s used to it now, used to sleeping on her cramped sofa bed. It had been something of a return to childhood, when the four of them – Mom, Dad, Di and Chris – lived in a trailer together. Never enough room, but the love and fun made up for it, until Dad left, sucked into a black hole of drug use and gambling debts.  
  
And then Mom had died.  
  
“I don’t know,” he says to Zach. “Just an aversion to change, I guess.”  
  
“God, I’d kill for a change,” Zach says, smiling.  
  
“You’re over sword-swallowing?”  
  
“Trust me, I will  _never_  be over sword-swallowing.” They both laugh. Chris is enjoying Zach’s easy company, and he can see why the Daisy is so popular among the troupe. “But the actual performance, lately it’s been giving me a sword throat.”  
  
“Did you say  _sore_  or  _sword_?”  
  
“Oh. ‘Sword throat’ is part of the lingo,” Zach explains. “But yeah, basically. Sore throat.”  
  
“That’s…so dumb. I’m sorry,” Chris adds quickly. “Sorry. That was rude.”  
  
“No problem. The impalement arts can be hokey.”  
  
Chris is still embarrassed; half the conversations he’s had with Zach since the Daisies arrived seem to end in Chris insulting him. “What drew you to the impalement arts?” he asks.  
  
“Lea,” Zach says. “When she realized she couldn’t fly she decided it was knives or nothing. I didn’t mind at the time. I got off on the risk, although these days with sword-swallowing I worry more about puncturing something vital inside than impressing the boys. I still like the tumbling, though. I used to be a cheerleader, so I’ve always enjoyed that.”  
  
Chris chuckles, and then sees Zach’s rueful smile. “You’re  _serious_? Jesus, man, sorry. Again.” He feels gauche and unkind, but Zach, as usual, doesn’t take offense.  
  
“I know, I know. Male cheerleaders are pretty common these days, but they haven’t quite penetrated the universal consciousness. So to speak.” He sends a sidelong glance at Chris, who trips over his own feet. Zach puts out a hand to steady him. “But that’s me. A rarity. Do me a favor, though, and don’t tell John about the cheerleading. He’s having enough fun teasing me as it is.”  
  
They turn back, pausing at the outskirts of the forest. The flags on the Big Top are flapping in a light breeze, and the morning is bright. Zach is smiling like he has a secret, something to tell.  
  
“I got up so early, and now I’m going to be late for Karl,” Chris says, but makes no movement to leave. He looks again at the curve of Zach’s mouth.  
  
Zach says, “Listen, I’ve been thinking. Lea won’t do it, but maybe we could fly together?”  
  
Chris stares, and then says, “I don’t do trapeze anymore.”  
  
“I know, but I thought –”  
  
“Well, you thought wrong.” Chris stalks off towards the mess tent, ignoring Zach’s calls.  
  
Karl is less than impressed with him being fifteen minutes late, but Chris doesn’t reply to his insults. He’s ashamed of himself for snapping at Zach. When the breakfast line enters Chris tries to save a place for him so he can apologize, but Zach is sitting with the ring crew today and making Eric laugh his unapologetically loud laugh.  
  
Karl puts Chris on clean-up to make up for being late, which Chris thinks is unfair considering he’s only a volunteer for meal prep. But he stays and helps anyway, because Zach disappears with the ring crew.  
  
What else does Chris have to do around Greenwood’s, after all?  
  
  
***  
  
  
Once again, Dianna is not in her trailer when Chris comes to check. He’s beginning to contemplate some kind of implant tracking device when Zoë, performing a routine on a gymnastics beam set up next to her own trailer, reminds him that Di had a physio appointment in town this morning.  
  
“Lea took her,” she adds, with a back flip off the beam to underscore her point. She’s practicing a new dismount move.  
  
Lea, again. Chris is starting to feel very unnecessary.  
  
 _Someone_  had to take her, though – the one time Chris tried to teach Dianna how to drive, they didn’t speak to each other for three days afterwards and she’s refused to get behind the wheel of a car ever since.  
  
Chris sees Bruce in the distance, and ducks out of sight behind Zoë’s trailer. He doesn’t want to be asked  _again_  about his decision. He sneaks back to his own trailer, but stops at the door. There’s not much to do at this time of day, when the artists are practicing. Usually he spends the morning with Di, taking care of her, or trying to persuade her to let him take care of her. But she’s gone, and Bruce might come looking for him if he stays here in his own place.  
  
Chris decides to head for Zach’s trailer, which he’s set up with chairs and a table outside. They’re under a large umbrella, so if he’s not there, Chris can wait. It’s also shielded from Bruce’s RV, so he can hide without obviously hiding.  
  
He raps on the trailer door before heading towards a chair, not expecting a response, but the door opens and Zach looks at him in surprise. “Hey.”  
  
“Hey! I thought you’d be practicing.”  
  
“Then why’d you come?”  
  
“I was going to wait,” Chris says, shifting on his feet. “I wanted to apologize.”  
  
“Come in.” Zach flings the door open and Chris steps inside. Zach has finished establishing himself in his new trailer. Like most circus folk, Chris can see he doesn’t have many personal belongings. Nothing to tie him down too much, even though he’ll take his home with him when he moves.  
  
Zach has put up a poster of yoga positions and lined up several books in the space that’s supposed to be used for stacking plates. They’re varied in genre – a book about America and the Middle East, a New-Agey title about finding the well of truth in oneself (Chris rolls his eyes), a collected edition of Shakespeare and a trashy-looking gay erotica novel.  
  
Zach sees him looking at it and clears his throat. “I, uh. I just like to give my mind a rest sometimes from more lofty concerns. Like the imperializing effects of capitalism and shit.”  
  
“Very intellectual.”  
  
“Well, I goofed off a lot when I was younger, so I try to educate myself these days.”  
  
Chris feels bad at that. He and Di were home-schooled by their parents, and after Dad left and Mom died, they were taught by other members of the troupe. They even took the SATs and scored well enough to apply for some scholarships, although neither of them wanted to do anything but perform. But Greenwood’s has traditionally emphasized training the mind as well as the body. Chris knows a lot of other circus performers have never had the same opportunities as he has.  
  
“Greenwood’s sponsors a GED program,” he starts, but Zach interrupts.  
  
“I managed to scrape in my high school diploma, but thanks all the same.”  
  
“Oh. Well, I think that’s cool. Learning and stuff. I need to read more. Di reads all the time these days. We even thought about college at one stage.”  
  
“I wasn’t a great student, but I think knowing about the world is important.”  
  
“For sure. Absolutely. And people learn in all different ways.”  
  
“Chris, you can stop trying to not offend me.”  
  
“I’m just trying to…yeah, not offend you.” He sits down on the sofa. It’s similar to Di’s and he feels comfortable on it. “Sorry.”  
  
“I don’t offend easily.” Zach pulls across a chair from the kitchenette. “So, you said something about an apology?”  
  
“I’m sorry about this morning, walking off like that.” Chris doesn’t know what else to say, but Zach leans forward.  
  
“I’m sorry, too. I know it’s a big decision for you, and I promise I’ll stop bugging you about it. I was just excited, you know? I’ve always wanted to train for flying, but I never got the chance before.”  
  
Chris looks him over, wondering how he’d look in costume for flying. Magnificent. Lithe and elegant and magnificent.Zach looks back at him, his lips curved in that same smile from this morning, questioning and knowing at the same time. And then he raises his eyebrows a little, stands up and holds out his hand.  
  
It’s possibly the sexiest thing Chris has ever seen, that steady hand extended to him in invitation. He puts his hand in Zach’s, and stands up.  
  
“I don’t suppose you’d like to go to bed with me?” Zach asks, still smiling that smile, and Chris laughs.  
  
“I’d like that very much.”  
  
Chris has always been agile on the ground and graceful as a bird in the air, but he’s turned into a clomping draught horse now, hopping around trying to pull his jeans off. And Zach doesn’t help, chuckling at Chris and pulling off his own clothes as though they’re just Velcroed on like his waistcoat from last night. He sits back on the bed, watching the show until Chris glares at him, and then he holds out his arms.  
  
“Come here, dork.”  
  
Chris falls onto the bed, a mass of constricted limbs and twisted denim, and lets Zach take his shoes off and guide his arms out of his tee.  
  
“This is one of the most humiliating moments of my life,” Chris says, once his head is free. “Just so you know.”  
  
“Enthusiasm is always a good thing. A-plus for effort.”  
  
He’s about to retort when Zach plants his mouth on Chris’s and starts kissing him.  _Shut up_ , Chris tells himself.  _Just shut up and enjoy_. He already knows it’s going to be incredible, because he’s seen the way Zach can move, contorting his body and holding impossible positions. Even better, Zach swallows _swords_. His tongue is dexterous, curling gymnastically in Chris’s mouth. He starts kissing down Chris’s neck, and Chris bucks up underneath him.  
  
“Easy.” Zach nuzzles into his collar bone.  
  
“Been a while,” Chris pants. “You know how it is.”  
  
“Then relax. Let me take care of you.”  
  
“Sounds like a plan.”  
  
Chris can’t keep from squirming as Zach leisurely investigates his body. Chris feels self-conscious for a second – he’s not in the top shape he used to be, and he’s always had a propensity for a bit of a tummy. And he ate a bigger breakfast than normal this morning. But Zach makes a delighted noise and rubs his face into his stomach like he can’t get enough of it, until Chris grabs at him, laughing.  
  
“Dude, you’re giving me stubble rash on my belly. I get it, you like the paunchy look.”  
  
“What are you talking about? You’re not paunchy. You’re soft and warm and  _God_ , I want to eat you all up. You’re like a big warm bowl of mashed potatoes.”  
  
Chris splutters in protest, until Zach pinches him. “Quiet, you. It’s a compliment. You’re like comfort food.”  
  
“More like I  _eat_  too much comfort food.”  
  
“You’re fucking beautiful and you know it. Don’t make me leave hickeys all over this gorgeous tummy.”  
  
Chris sighs, but gives in, puts his hands behind his head to give Zach full access, who dives between his legs to lick at his nuts. Having his balls played with is Chris’s second-favorite thing about sex, and has to stifle a groan with his own hand. One of the annoying things about circus living is that there’s limited privacy. He doesn’t need John and Zoë to come running again to listen and giggle under the window.  
  
Zach takes the same approach to sex as he seems to do to everything else – laidback, appreciative,  _fun_. He suckles on Chris’s ball sack for a full five minutes until Chris is begs him to move on, which is  _definitely_  not something Chris normally asks for.  
  
“Oh, you want me to suck your cock now?” Zach asks. He looks up, eyes wide and innocent.  
  
“ _Yes_. Please.”  
  
Zach gives a devilish grin, and Chris imagines little horns peeking out from that thick, tousled hair. He drops his head back to the pillow. The idea of a demon-Zach is turning him on much more than it should.  
  
But then Zach’s mouth is around his dick, tongue contorting as deftly as Zach’s entire body can bend in his acts. He feels Zach’s nose rubbing into his pubes and Chris realizes he’s been swallowed down in one go. The thought spears him through with lust, his ass clenching down on nothing. His entire length down Zach’s throat – he thinks of swords and sheaths, tries to distract himself. He’s going to shoot way too soon. He tugs at Zach’s hair.  
  
“Yeah, pull my hair,” Zach says, lifting his head up.  
  
“No, no –  _stop_. Stop is what I mean,” Chris says. “I’m too close.” And although he’s right on the edge, his heart drumming in his chest and his balls pulling up, a giggle comes bubbling out of him. He hasn’t felt this good for  _months_.  
  
Zach slides back up to lie next to him. “How are we doing this? You want to fuck, right?”  
  
“Yes.”  _Hell_  yes, he wants to fuck.  
  
“You like to be on top?”  
  
A little shy, Chris shakes his head. No one he’s been with before has asked outright. They usually figure it out with body language or awkward gestures. “I like it okay, but I prefer – unless you—”  
  
“Nope,” Zach says. “That suits me fine.” He rolls Chris over, and then spends some time exploring his back, licking over his birthmark and running fingers over the muscles under the skin. “I really want to fuck you.  Now.  Please.”  
  
“I haven’t even had a chance to touch your dick yet,” Chris points out with a snort of laughter. “But that’s fine, that’s totally fine, I’ll have to owe you.”  
  
“We are in furious agreement.” Chris hears a drawer opening, foil rustling, the small flick of a cap, and then Zach gasps. “What?” Chris asks, worried.  
  
“I’m sorry, but we’ll have to postpone the fucking for now. What is  _this_? It’s like a natural wonder.” And Chris feels teeth running over his ass, biting into him like he’s the best thing Zach has ever tasted.  
  
“That  _tickles_!”  
  
“Mmmm. Stop moving around, let me just do this for a while.”  
  
“It’s just a butt. I’m sure you’ve seen your fair share.”  
  
“Not like  _this_ ,” Zach says, and his reverent tone makes Chris snort into the pillow. But he has to admit, Zach’s unabashed pleasure in his body is making him feel  _great_. Flattered. Proud, even: pleased with his soft tummy and round ass that he’s always found a little embarrassing. Di used to call him Bubble Butt sometimes.  
  
When Zach noses into his crack, Chris instinctively opens his legs wider and lifts his hips. Zach is making the same noise that Chris has heard him make over Karl’s cooking, tongue snaking back and forth over his hole, and Chris swallows so hard he thinks he might choke. No one has ever done this to him before.  
  
He grunts out something, supposed to be Zach’s name, or  _please fuck me_ , maybe, but it’s unintelligible, and all Zach does is grunt back a noise of agreement, and press his tongue in, flexing and seeking. Chris goes rigid, nerves screaming and balls buzzing. He can feel Zach’s teeth grazing delicate flesh and his breath hot and damp, his tongue twitching and driving in, again and again.  
  
“ _Zach_.” He’s taken as much of this as he can.  
  
“Mm?”  
  
“You need to fuck me  _right now_.” His tone is deadly serious, and he sags in relief as Zach withdraws his tongue with a sigh and reaches for the lube.  
  
“Next time I get to have all the fun I want,” he says, leaning down for a final bite to Chris’s butt cheek.  
  
“Next time,” Chris promises, thrilled to think that Zach is already seeing a next time for this. “No one’s ever…I mean, that was the first time anyone’s…”  
  
“You’ve never been rimmed before? With an ass like  _that_?” Zach sounds so incredulous that Chris laughs. “You’re breaking my heart.”  
  
Zach takes  _way_  too long, in Chris’s opinion, sliding fingers into him and waiting for him to adjust, even though, yeah, it’s been months for Chris and so it’s thoughtful. But when he moves Chris back over to face him and pulls a pillow under his hips; when he rolls on the rubber, and then starts pushing in, his cock long and curved at  _just_  the right angle – it’s perfect. Watching Zach’s intense concentration and the way his eyebrows squeeze together, the pleasure that flashes across his face when he’s deep inside, makes Chris want to do this over and over.  
  
“Fuck me, come on,” he begs, and Zach grimaces.  
  
“Yeah, just give me…I don’t wanna spill in the first thirty seconds. It’s been a while for me too.” He lets his head fall forward between his shoulders, and Chris hears him slow his breathing.  
  
It doesn’t take too long before he begins to move, and this – this is Chris’s number one favorite thing about sex, feeling filled up; the consistent rub inside against sensitive skin, sensitive nerves; hearing Zach groan as he squeezes his muscles down. Zach pulls Chris’s legs up and twists his own body, moves them into some crazy position that makes Chris want to find ridiculous except that it feels  _fantastic_.  
  
Zach’s bent knee is across his chest, holding him down, and his other leg is wedged under Chris’s thigh and Zach is leaning over him, watching his face, fucking into him in a regular, urgent rhythm. When Chris feels a grabbing, greedy hand on his dripping cock, he can’t help it – he shouts.  
  
“Shhhh.” Fingers flutter into Chris’s mouth, giving him something else to do than attract attention. But he’s whimpering and he can’t stop until Zach speeds up his hand and his thrusting, and Chris bites down too hard on the fingers in his mouth, shoots all over himself.  
  
He’s aware of the noise Zach makes when he comes minutes later, and feels smug to find it’s  _much_  louder than Chris has been during this whole thing.  
  
Zach unwinds his legs and collapses onto the bed, an arm flung over Chris’s chest. His hand runs idly down to stroke Chris’s tummy, rubs jizz into his skin.  
  
“Nnf,” Chris says, trying to stop him.  
  
“You can shower. After that effort, I get to finger-paint if I want.”  
  
He has a point.  
  
Chris gives an enormous yawn, relishing the throb in his ass. He hasn’t come so hard for weeks, and he hasn’t fucked like that for  _months_. Since the accident, there’s only been a ring crew guy who was traveling with the circus for a couple of weeks, and left without giving notice. They usually stuck to blowing each other. Marco wasn’t  _great_  at sex, but he was willing, and he never expected Chris to stay the night or anything, so it suited him.  
  
But Zach – Zach is a phenomenal fuck.  
  
“I’ll do it,” Chris says.  
  
“Huh?”  
  
“The training. And if Lea won’t perform with you, I guess…I guess maybe we could try to do something together.”  
  
Zach just nods, not making a big deal out of it. “Okay. Thanks, man.”  
  
“Hey!”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Is that what this epic screwing was about? Bribery?”  
  
Zach just chuckles. He stands, stretches up on his toes, and Chris eyes his butt as the muscles clench. Nice. “You need the bathroom?” he asks Chris.  
  
“Nah.”  
  
Zach brings back a warm, wet cloth to wipe him down, even though Chris would be content to drowse, encrusted. “You’re the one who wanted to finger-paint,” Chris points out sleepily, as Zach cleans him up.  
  
Zach leans down to kiss his stomach. “Need my canvas clean for round two.”  
  
“There’s a round two?” Chris’s eyes pop open.  
  
“There’s a round two. Sure you don’t need a bathroom break?”  
  
  
***  
  
  
Round two ends in a mutual knockout. They’re woken several hours later by the slamming open of the trailer door. Chris starts in the bed and half-sits, guiltily clutching the sheet up to his chest. Which is ludicrous, his brain insists; they’re adults. But when he sees Lea’s expression, which gives new meaning to the term ‘shooting daggers’, he swallows and pulls the sheet a little higher.  
  
“Karl’s looking for you. You’re supposed to be on lunch prep,” she snaps at Chris, and then folds her arms to stare at Zach. “And I don’t know what you think  _you’re_  doing, but—”  
  
“I’m training for the flying trapeze.” He smirks, and Chris is pretty sure, for a second, that Lea is going to prove the reality of spontaneous human combustion.  
  
“Your sister,” she spits at Chris instead, “is also wondering where you are. She wants to talk to you about her physio. Which you  _forgot_  about this morning.” She whirls on a heel and slams the door again on her way out.  
  
Zach lies back in the bed again, tugging at Chris, but he rolls up to sit on the edge of the bed. “I should go. I need to see how Di’s doing. And lunch prep – Karl’s gonna kill me after I was late this morning, too.”  
  
“Don’t let Lea get under your skin. She’s just…Lea.”  
  
“I’m not.” He searches for his briefs, finds them half under the bed, and pulls them on.  
  
“So, about fly training.”  
  
“We can talk about it later.”  
  
“Oh, come on. You’re pulling out now?” Zach sounds dismayed.  
  
“I said I’d do it, didn’t I?”  
  
He finishes dressing in silence, avoiding Zach’s eyes. It’s only when he’s about to pull the trailer door open that he says over his shoulder, “Save me a seat at lunch. We can talk about it then.”  
  
He runs to Di’s trailer, trying to ignore the fact that he stinks of sex. For once, she’s there. Lea, thankfully, is not.  
  
“I’m sorry,” is the first thing out of his mouth after he bursts in. Dianna is sitting at the kitchenette table, drinking tea and fiddling with a digital camera.  
  
“For what?” she asks, astonished.  
  
“Your appointment.”  
  
“Oh. It’s no big deal. I was going to come get you, but Lea offered to take me.”  
  
Chris frowns. “I don’t like her.”  
  
“She’s not a fan of yours either. But I just wanted to tell you, it’s all going well. They said I need to keep moving around, try to do a little more during the day, so that’s what I’m going to do. Now sit down, let me show you my new toy.” She smiles her brightest smile and Chris sits obediently. “You know how Mom was always into photography? I decided I might try it out myself. Lea thought it would get me out and about more.”  
  
She tells him all about her new camera, bought in town at a pawn shop, explaining the different settings and the zoom and what she plans to do, the pictures she’d love to take, until Chris stops her. “Whose idea was this?”  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“Was this your idea, or Lea’s?”  
  
“What on earth does that have to do with anything?” She’s annoyed, her tone cold, but Chris is annoyed too.  
  
“She has an awful lot of influence over you, for someone you just met.”  
  
“Oh, get out.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“Get  _out_.” She turns back to the camera and ignores him.  
  
Fine. He knows when he’s not wanted. And he has to shower, anyway.  
  
  
***

 

Karl is displeased. He registers his displeasure by making Chris cut all the onions and then bake a stupidly complex vegan quiche for Lea – and for the other takers now, who are fascinated with the new food choices and have been gathering like hyenas. Fortunately there is always something left for Lea, because Karl has been watching over the Picky Eaters section like a gargoyle since its institution, and is not above slapping hands.  
  
“But seriously, Chris,” Karl says to him after he’s produced the eggless quiche, “if you don’t want to help anymore, just say the word. Just say the word! You don’t think there are plenty of other people begging to help out in here?”  
  
Chris knows for a fact that there are not, but he still feels bad about it. “I’m sorry, I am. I just got…waylaid.”  _Way_  laid. He smirks, and can’t hide it before Karl sees.  
  
“Twice,” Karl says with suspicion.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“In one day?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Holy Christ, you’re shagging him.” Karl leans forward, his eyes wide with understanding.  
  
“I am not!” But it’s useless. His face is bright red, and it’s not from the heat in the close air. “Fine. I am. I have, I mean. I did.”  
  
“Just  _now_?”  
  
“Omigod, we are  _not_  having this conversation,” Chris says in a rush, and turns away to poke at the giant salad, adds some parsley.  
  
“I’ll just ask Zoë and John. They always know the dirty details.”  
  
“Not this time.” Chris sweeps out into the mess tent to put the salad at the buffet. By now, people in line are complaining about the hold-up, so Karl comes out to yell at them. Zach is at the head of the line, but behaving so well that Karl lets him pass while he stands in front of the rest of them like a bouncer.  
  
Zach motions Chris over. “Stick with me, kid, I have friends in high places.”  
  
“Karl will send me to the back of the line if he sees, or make me wait till everyone else has eaten.”  
  
Zach takes his hand, squeezes it. “I’ll stand up for you.”  
  
“Whoa!” shouts a voice, and Chris closes his eyes, groans inside. John, of course. He’s stopped complaining at Karl and is staring. “Hey – are you two, like, boyfriends now?”  
  
Zach holds Chris’s hand up in the air like he’s won a boxing match. “You snooze, you lose, Cho.”  
  
“Back of the line,” Karl says to John. “No – I don’t want to hear it. Back. Of. The. Line.”  
  
He waves through the next lot of six while Zach and Chris start picking out their lunch. “What did you make?” Zach asks.  
  
“The fried onions,” Chris says, wrinkling his nose. “Can’t you tell by my eyes?”  
  
“They do look a little pink. What else?”  
  
“The salad over there. And that vegan quiche thing, God forgive me.”  
  
Zach heaps his plate high with onions, quiche and salad, and follows Chris to one of the long tables. “I did think about bringing you a pillow,” he says with a wink. “These benches are tough enough when you  _haven’t_  just been fucked twice over. Wow, you’re cute when you blush. We’ll have to find more ways to make you do that.”  
  
Flustered, Chris says, “Are you going to shut up for five seconds and let me talk about training?”  
  
“My lips are sealed.”  
  
“So, look. We won’t be able to get anything down for a while, but the most important shows are in LA. LA is where we make sixty percent of our sponsorship and profit for the whole tour. Bruce is going to push us all as hard as he can till we get there, because everything before that is just practice, working out the kinks. It’s bigger; more people will come and we’ll be there until the end of the season. We have our fundraiser gala there. And since you have static experience, and acrobatics, I think –  _if_  you practice every day and do  _everything_  I tell you – I think maybe we could do something in LA.”  
  
Zach’s eyes go saucer-wide, his fork paused halfway between plate and open mouth, loaded with salad. He puts down the fork. “Are you  _serious_?” he squeaks.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
He’s serious. Di is going to stay mad at him for the foreseeable future, and in any case, he’s being supplanted by Lea. He’s not going to have much to do day-to-day. Chris figures he can start slow, anyway – Zach will need plenty of solo training before they try as a duo, so Chris can stay grounded for a while and get used to the idea. And by the time he has to climb the ladder up into the wide canvas of the Big Top, he’ll have a handle on his anxiety issues. He hopes.  
  
Zach flings his arms around Chris’s neck, squeezing the air out of him and chanting  _thank you thank you thank you!_ into his ear. Chris can hear shouts and catcalls from the rest of the mess tent, but Zach keeps hugging him. At last, he pulls back and grins into Chris’s face.  
  
Chris laughs and flushes. “I don’t…really…it’s no big—”  
  
Zach kisses him full on the mouth, provoking another cacophonous noise from the audience.  _Everyone_  is watching. Well – not  _quite_  everyone. After they break, Chris is quietly satisfied to hear John shouting from the back of the line outside, “What? What’s going on? What did I miss?”  
  
  
***  
  
  
At three o’clock, Chris wanders over to the practice area with a gym bag, trying to ignore each pair of eyes tracking his every step across the campground. He’s wearing his training gear for the first time in a long time, and it’s nothing special to look at – but he knows that’s not why people are staring. And it’s not his tummy or his ass, either, thankfully. They’re just staring at him.  
  
Zoë skips up to walk beside him. “Whatcha doin’?”  
  
“I’m going to start training Zach.”  
  
“Really?  _Really_  really?”  
  
“Really.”  
  
“Does Di know?”  
  
“I don’t think Di would care right now,” Chris says, and Zoë stops walking with him.  
  
“I think she might, you moron,” she calls after him.  
  
John is surprised into silence when Chris rounds the Big Top to the practice area. He’s rehearsing with his clowns, trying to find new and innovative ways to fall over themselves. He stops dead on the tumbling mats when he sees Chris, and gets himself bowled over by another clown.  
  
There is no full-size rigging set up for the flying trapeze, either in the practice ring or in the Big Top. No one has been anxious to take on trapeze full-time in the new season, and for this town Bruce decided to concentrate on the new acts from Zach and Lea, bypassing fly trap altogether. The practice ring does hold some high and uneven bars, and Chris intends to set up a single low swing trapeze that will do well enough for today.  
  
Eric arrives with the equipment and frame, and they start setting up together.  
  
John materializes at Chris’s side. “Want some help?”  
  
“No.” Chris takes the ratchet from Eric and starts tightening a bolt into frame. Eric crouches to hold the frame steady.  
  
“But I’d be glad to—”  
  
Chris turns on John. “Get back to your clowning, Cho,” he snarls. Eric looks up at them in surprise.  
  
John shrugs, and walks off.  
  
“What in the hell is up with you two?” Eric asks. “Ever since you got back, you’ve been—”  
  
“Nothing.” Chris goes back to his ratchet, tightens the bolt as far as it’ll go.  
  
They finish rigging the swing trapeze in silence. Afterwards, Eric helps him drag a line of crash mats underneath.  
  
Chris opens his gym bag and pulls out a box of rosin powder and a box of magnesium carbonate, running his fingers over the hinges. The boxes were a gift from his parents on his fifth birthday, when they deemed him old enough to start fly training and aerials. His mother’s rhyme comes back to him and he smiles:  _rosin for grip, mag for slip_. It always helped his five-year-old self remember which to use for what.  
  
There’s a wolf-whistle from across the training ground, and Chris turns to see Zach bowing at a group of female acrobats who are registering their approval at his leggings and tight white t-shirt. Chris has to turn back to his boxes, hoping his semi will die before Zach makes it over. Zach looks even better than he imagined, with his long, supple legs on full display.  
  
Zach jogs up, and Chris crouches with a towel in his lap, trying to look busy.  
  
“Next time I’ll have to fuck you  _past_  exhaustion, I see,” is the first thing Zach says, and Chris throws him an exasperated look.  
  
“This isn’t going to work if you keep being…like that.”  
  
“And by ‘this’, do you mean the trapeze training, or…us?”  
  
 _There’s an ‘us’ already?_  Chris stammers out something, until Zach gives a cheeky grin.  
  
“Settle down. I promise to stop referring to our mutual pleasure if you promise to stop blushing like that. Makes me want to jump you right here.”  
  
Chris stands and folds his arms, tired of feeling on the back foot all the time with Zach. “Here’s how this is going to work. You’re going to do a round of training exercises, and then I’m going to tell you all the ways in which you suck. Then you’ll do them again and again until you suck less. And maybe, in a few weeks, when you’re not face-planting into the mats three or four times a session,  _maybe_  I’ll let you get on a full-size flying trapeze and swing back and forth. And if you’re  _very_  good, I might even let you try flying.”  
  
Zach’s face is priceless, but Chris keeps his own straight. “I was just teasing,” Zach protests.  
  
Chris just raises an eyebrow.  
  
“And that’s not fair! I’m already good at a whole bunch of aerial arts  _and_  I happen to know that training doesn’t take  _that_  long—”  
  
“It does at Greenwood’s. It does with me.”  
  
That shuts Zach up, and Chris has to turn away to hide a smile. “Okay,” he says, “Warm up.”  
  
Once Zach has done his stretches and bends – Chris tries not to stare too much at that flexible, suggestive body – it’s time to begin. He holds out one of his boxes to Zach. “Come here – you’ll need some mag for your hands.”  
  
If there was one thing Chris wasn’t expecting, it was to have  _fun_. With Lea, probably, it wouldn’t have happened. But Zach is obliging, hard-working and non-complaining. He might be flirty and laid-back but once they get down to the training, he’s focused and professional. Even John and the clowns spend more time watching Chris put Zach through his paces than going through their own.  
  
Zach is strong and toned, able to perform a steady handstand on the high bar and make it look effortless. He flips off and lands perfectly from the routine five times, and ignores the claps from the gathering crowd.  
  
“Not as bad as you thought?” he asks Chris.  
  
“I know you can perform on a bar – that’s not an issue. But now I want you to do the same on the low trapeze.”  
  
Zach shrugs. “Not a problem.”  
  
“More mag.” Chris offers the powder again, but Zach wrinkles his nose.  
  
“Too much dries my hands out. I think I’m fine.”  
  
“What did I say at the start?”  
  
Zach rolls his eyes. “I’m  _doing_  everything you say; I just think my hands are dry enough. Come on, man, I’m a professional too. Help me up?”  
  
He could push it, but Chris thinks that maybe Zach’s right – maybe this is Chris’s issue, after what happened with Di, and he’s being over-cautious. He decides to give Zach the benefit of the doubt, and goes down on one knee on the thick mat underneath the trapeze. He lets Zach stand on his cupped hands, then hefts up so Zach can grab the bar. He’s only a few feet off the ground, but Chris still feels a stirring fear in his gut as Zach rocks up to sit on the trapeze.  
  
He pushes the fear aside and asks Zach to start swinging back and forth. He can see from Zach’s face that he thinks this is just child’s play, but ignores it. Slow, rigorous training is what Greenwood’s is all about, and he wants Zach to get a feel for the movement before they try anything else.  
  
“He’s not bad,” says a voice next to Chris, and he jumps a little, caught up in staring at Zach’s form on the trapeze.  
  
“He’s had good grounding,” he says to Bruce.  
  
“I’m glad you decided to…well. I’ll leave you to it. Listen, you and Di should come see me later; I have something to run by you both.”  
  
Bruce wanders off, and that’s when Chris realizes that most of the troupe has gathered at the outskirts of the practice area to watch. Even Dianna is there, standing next to Lea. She waves when he looks at her, her face delighted even over the distance. Chris watches her say something to Lea, and they start walking over. Lea does not look quite so delighted.  
  
He turns back to Zach, who is still swinging back and forth, kicking his body instinctively like a salmon swimming upstream, and looking bored. “Try from the knees,” he says, and Zach hooks his knees over the bar, turns upside down.  
  
“You need to swing higher,” Chris says. “Try to get perpendicular to the ground, but with line still taut. Control is key. It’s about your posture at each stage.” Zach arches his back and stretches out his arms – he’s got a great reach, Chris notes – and starts swinging with more force and more precision, his face tense with concentration.  
  
“You didn’t tell me!” Di says when she’s closer, and then throws her arms around his neck. “This is fantastic. I’m  _so_  glad.”  
  
Chris carefully wraps his arms back around her and makes noises of agreement. He’s never sure what mood she’s going to be in these days; half the time he’s getting kicked out of her trailer, and the other half she’s all smiles and sunshine.  
  
“I guess I should’ve said.”  
  
“Word travels fast. Zoë was breaking down my door a minute after she saw you coming over here.”  
  
“I hope you’ve taken all the appropriate safety precautions,” is all Lea says, and Chris doesn’t bother with a reply.  
  
They stand together, watching Zach, until Chris asks him, “You want to try a flip? Just backwards, off the bar, and land. Watch the trajectory.”  
  
“Can I somersault?”  
  
“No.”  
  
“Come on!”  
  
“He’s much better than this already, you know,” Lea says. “He could double-salto off. Show him!” she calls to Zach.  
  
“ _No_ ,” Chris says again, but Zach has already left the bar and is spinning in the air, once, twice. But Chris can see already that he’s misjudged the pace and the distance – classic mistake for anyone so used to stationary trapeze or bars, and Zach flops into the mat face-first.  
  
He’s up on his hands and knees in an instant, laughing at his own inelegance, and Lea and Di are giggling as well, but Chris feels a familiar surge of terror in his gut, rushing up through his chest until his heart is hammering so hard that his head is pulsing with it. He has to get away, but he’s hyperventilating within seconds and all he can do is stumble to the mat and try to sit. Zach has rolled off it by now and Chris can hear him saying his name, but it’s Lea’s voice that he focuses on, because she’s sitting next to him and rubbing his back and telling him everything’s okay.  
  
After a minute or two, his vision swims back into focus. Dianna looks frightened, and he can see Bruce in the distance dispersing the crowd, and Karl bellowing at John for gawking.  
  
“Maybe a paper bag?” Di’s voice is high and scared. “What’s  _wrong_  with him?”  
  
“He’s having a panic attack. He’ll be alright, just stand back and give him some space.” It’s Lea again, sounding practical and calm.  
  
“Come here.” Zach pulls Di close, simultaneously holding her up and letting her lean on him, her hands over her mouth and her eyes afraid.  
  
Chris can’t look at her any more, so he stares at the ground instead, at the dry grass blades and the ant tracking through the dirt, concentrates on the soothing up-and-down rub on his back. “It’ll be okay, just give yourself some time,” Lea says.  
  
His chest starts to relax and he can finally speak. “Don’t let anyone see.”  
  
“No one is watching. They’re all gone. It’s okay, it’s just us.”  
  
He never expected to feel grateful to Lea.  
  
He certainly never expected to feel grateful for her prickly, hostile behavior as she walks him back to his trailer, silencing every onlooker with nothing more than a glance. She tucks him into bed like a brusque hospital nurse, and brings him a mug of chamomile tea. Di and Zach sit in the other room, talking quietly, and Lea sits on the bed to watch him drink.  
  
“Thank you,” he says.  
  
She gives a tight smile. “You don’t need to thank me.” She takes the mug and breezes out of the room, as much as a person can breeze in such a small space.  
  
Di comes in next, her eyes bloodshot, and kisses him hard on the forehead. “Lea says you should rest for a bit and we’ll come see you later.”  
  
“Alright,” he says, docile.  
  
“Zach is having a quick shower and then he’s going to stay here with you, make sure you’re okay.”  
  
Chris almost makes a bad joke about how Zach’s comfort techniques might not be appropriate, but he catches himself in time. Instead, he says, “Alright,” again.  
  
"That wasn't the first time, was it?" Di asks.  "How long have you..."  She trails off when he looks away.  
  
"A while," he tells her.  
  
"I wish you'd told me."  
  
He doesn't reply.  Di sits with him, almost silent except for a few platitudes, until Zach comes to the doorway, wearing a towel around his waist and rubbing one over his head. “I’m good. Lea’s waiting for you outside, Di – you should get some rest too.”  
  
She gives Chris’s hand a squeeze. “Don’t forget who the patient in this family is supposed to be,” she says. “I’ll come by later. Lea and I will help Karl with dinner, so you just take your time resting.”  
  
“But your back –”  
  
“I told you, I need to get out more.” She gives him another hand-squeeze, and leaves the trailer.    
  
Zach drops his towels and slides into the bed next to him.  
  
“I’m all sweaty and gross,” Chris protests.  
  
“And I’m all clean and delicious. But we’re just resting for now.”  
  
“You’re making my pillow wet with your hair.”  
  
“Yep.”  
  
“That was really fucking embarrassing.”  
  
“As embarrassing as not being able to undress yourself this morning when I was trying to bed you?”  
  
“Zach.” It comes out as two whiny syllables:  _Zaa-aach_.  
  
Zach flings his arm across him and kisses his neck with exaggerated sound effects. “Mm. You  _are_  sweaty and gross. But still, somehow, irresistible. Don’t worry about before – it happens.”  
  
Chris sulkily turns over on his side, but Zach snuggles up close again.  
  
“You should have put on more mag when I told you.”  
  
“I’m sorry. I promise I’ll do everything you say from now on. And no more saltos until you say I’m ready. I don’t want to freak you out like that again.”  
  
Chris doesn’t reply.  
  
“When I get stressed out, I like to think about the ocean. A  _calm_  ocean. Serene and blue and beautiful.” As Zach speaks, Chris starts to think he can see it, too.  
  
“Calm blue ocean, huh? Pretty cliché.”  
  
“Works for me.”  
  
“I never wanted people to know,” Chris says. “I didn’t want them to know I’m weak like that.”  
  
“You’re not weak.”  
  
Chris doesn’t believe him for a second. “Lea will think I’m weak.”  
  
“Nah. She gets panic attacks, too.”  
  
That’s news. “She does?”  
  
“Sure. She’s kind of high-strung; I don’t know if you’ve noticed?” Chris snorts, and Zach cuddles him closer. “She’s suffered panic attacks for most of her life. Doesn’t like to talk about it much, but she said I could tell you if it would help. We couldn’t take her to a doctor or therapist or anything – no insurance. So she studied up on natural remedies, relaxation techniques, that kind of thing. She still gets them sometimes, but she’s better these days.”  
  
Chris finds himself disliking Lea less. “So you don’t think I’m some loser?”  
  
“Why would I think that?” Zach sounds puzzled.  
  
Well, alright. Chris smiles. His mind clears and he falls into a doze.  
  
  
***  
  
  
Chris has forgotten about Bruce’s summons, but Bruce hasn’t. He’s corralled into the RV the next evening, and finds his sister staring back at him from the sofa, sitting next to Simon. Simon is tensed as though ready to grab Dianna should she attempt escape. Chris is certain that they’re both about to get a telling-off for something they’ve done, and races through his memories to find something to match up to the guilty feeling.  
  
“You two look like you’re set for an execution,” Bruce says cheerfully. He pulls out his Uno cards. “I thought we could have a game.”  
  
Dianna is the only one in the troupe who ever beats Bruce at Uno, and that’s because she played endless games with him during his visits to the hospital. Bruce has developed a whole game of partnered Uno with complicated bidding rules, so Chris expects a resounding defeat. But after an hour or so, he and Dianna are ahead of Simon and Bruce, even though Chris isn’t quite sure what he’s doing or how they’re winning.  
  
Di is enjoying herself, and Chris is enjoying her happiness. She pauses, though, when Bruce uses his old nickname for her.  
  
“You know this game better than I do these days, Bona Dea. You’re taking us for a ride.”  
  
Chris watches her smile falter, but she pastes it back on. “I’m no goddess these days, Bruce, just another mortal like the rest of you.” She plays a card and then looks at her hand, refusing to meet anyone’s eyes.  
  
“I think you’re selling yourself short,” Bruce says, regarding his own cards. “There are a lot of people here with a lot of respect for you, and for Chris. In fact, that’s why I wanted to talk to both of you.”  
  
“Ooh, I think that’s my cue to leave,” Simon says. “Although let it be known that I fully support Bruce’s plan.”  
  
Chris and Dianna lock eyes, panicky. “Settle down,” Bruce tells them. “I’m not asking for a blood sacrifice.” Simon gives a wave as he exits, and they hear him whistling as he heads back to his own trailer.  
  
Silence falls in the RV.  
  
“So I guess the game is over,” Chris says, to break the tension. Bruce taps a chip on the table and looks between them.  
  
“Your mother would be proud of who you’ve become, both of you,” he says, and Chris tightens his fists, clenching as hard as he can and focusing on the cramp in his muscles. Dianna’s face is frozen in a neutral expression as she gathers together the cards. “And so would your dad.”  
  
“We don’t care what he would think,” Dianna says icily.  
  
 _I kinda care_ , Chris thinks, but he knows that saying it will just provoke another argument. Di has never forgiven their father for his addictions or his desertion. Chris can’t bring himself to feel that kind of hatred, though – he misses Dad, or at least, the Dad of his childhood. They don’t even know where he is these days; probably dead.  
  
“I’m proud of you both, too,” Bruce continues. “And while I don’t want to bring up any painful memories, I wanted to discuss your future here. You know I was close to your parents – Bob was a great business partner before...”  
  
“Before he ran off with half a million in sponsorship and lost it all on the Santa Anita Derby?” Di supplies.  
  
“Yes. And your mom, she meant a great deal to me. You know that. Her cancer was the reason we increased our health insurance policies.” Bruce looks away, and Chris remembers the rumors that had gone around after Dad left and before Mom got sick. Mom had found it hard to cope at the time and Bruce spent a lot of time with the three of them, helping out with meals and having long conversations with Mom late into the night. Chris has clear memories of watching them sit at the kitchenette table and share a few glasses of Bruce’s finest whisky, not talking much. Once Chris saw her start to cry, and Bruce slid a hand across the table to hold hers.  
  
Bruce clears his throat. “Your family has been a part of Greenwood’s in one capacity or another for decades, which makes you my family. So I wanted to discuss what’s going to happen when I retire.”  
  
“What are you talking about?” Chris asks, at the same time that Dianna gasps, “What do you mean, retire?”  
  
“Not for some time,” Bruce says. “But I’m not getting any younger. And you know your father – no, really Di, you’re going to have to stop snarling every time I say his name. I’m talking about a time before the bad stuff happened. He  _did_  care about you two, and so did your mom, and they made plans for you.”  
  
“Yes, we know,” Di says. “They had a college fund for us, until  _Bob_  spent it all on drugs and horses.”  
  
“Bona Dea, there’s no way I can defend what your father did,” Bruce replies, “but you need to listen to me now. Your parents had dreams for you that they never got to see fulfilled. They did want you to have the choice of higher education, if that’s what you wanted. You haven’t wanted it so far but now things have changed.”  
  
Chris has been waiting and wondering, content to hear Bruce out, until now. “What do you mean? Is this because of my – because of yesterday?”  
  
“You’re both adults now, and you need to hear me on this. Neither of you can perform like you used to and not like I think you  _want_  to. You’re both welcome here in any capacity you like, for as long as you want, but I’d hate to think you’re missing out on other opportunities. Maybe you should think about going to college after all.”  
  
“You’re kicking us out?” Chris asks, shocked.  
  
“Oh, my God,” Di says, her eyes filling with tears.  
  
“No,” Bruce says. “No, no,  _no_. You will  _always_  have a home here. I’m just asking you to think it over – think outside the circus. We’ll always be waiting for you, but there’s a whole world out there for you to explore.”  
  
“I don’t want to be a part of that world,” Chris says. The world he knows in the circus isn’t exactly safe – injuries, and money’s always tight, and no real roots in the land because they’re always traveling, but…out there, it’s worse. He’s sure of it. Better the devil you know. He thinks of Zach.  
  
Di has composed herself again, smoothing her skirt over her thighs and watching her hands. “You think we should go to college?” she asks. “What do you think we’re going to study there? Medicine? Law? You think I could live out the rest of my life in a thirty-storey office building, safe and secure? I’d be looking out the window every day at the ground, thinking about when I used to fly above it and not stare at it from behind plate glass.”  
  
Chris feels a lump in his throat, coughs. “She’s right,” he says roughly. “You know she’s right.”  
  
“And anyway,” Di continues, “I  _am_  going to be performing again. I’ve agreed to be Lea’s target girl. And Lea’s going to do the Veiled Wheel with me.”  
  
“No, she’s not,” Chris says immediately, and glares. “Zach’s told me about that crazy idea of hers, and no sister of mine is going to have anyone throwing knives at her. Are you insane?”  
  
“You think Zach’s insane? He’s done it for long enough,” she counters.  
  
“Even Zach won’t do the Veiled Wheel!”  
  
They bicker back and forth, voices getting louder and louder until Bruce roars, “Enough!”  
  
Chris sits back down, ashamed of himself for rising out of his seat to tower over Di when he knows she can’t just spring up like he can. But he’s more worried about Bruce, who looks angry with both of them.  
  
“You can still perform  _and_  get an education. It’s not one or the other,” Bruce tells them. “But for the love of God, you two need to get it together. This whole place almost fell apart after the accident, because you two are the poles holding the damn tent up. You think people don’t notice that you’re not as close as you used to be? Don’t hear you fighting behind closed doors? You’re the heart of this place, you always will be, so you need to work out your issues.”  
  
“We don’t have issues,” they say together, even though Chris knows it’s a lie. But there are not enough  _sorries_  in the world to make up for what he did to Dianna.  
  
“You’re acting like I’m asking you to throw yourselves on a bonfire,” Bruce sighs. “I just thought you could take some time out for college, do business studies, or maybe showbiz management, something like that – something to help you if…”  
  
“If?” Chris asks.  
  
“If you take over Greenwood’s.”  
  
Chris and Dianna take that in, gaping at Bruce.  
  
“Oh, go to bed,” Bruce says wearily, when the silence stretches. “This was a grand disaster. We can talk more some other time. It’s late; go to bed.”  
  
Chris and Dianna walk back to her trailer, brittle and polite with each other. They do not discuss Bruce’s offer at all. Chris holds the trailer door open for her and she primly says, “Thank you.”  
  
She pauses on the step before shutting her door, and looks like she’s about to say something, but Chris forestalls her.  
  
“You’re not a target girl,” he says. “And you’re not getting on that wheel. No way, no how. End of discussion.”  
  
She closes the door in his face.


End file.
